Apple is ending most or all of its support for a host of older Macs, according to a memo issued to Apple Authorized Service Providers this week. Headlining the bulletin is a range of "obsolete" products, which Apple classifies as hardware that was discontinued over seven years ago; these include the PowerBook G4, and digital audio or Quicksilver models of the PowerMac G4 and Macintosh Server G4. As of March 17th, no support of any kind will be available for the obsolete systems, including replacement parts.

The hardware losing most of its support on March 17th is what Apple terms "vintage," gear discontinued more than five years ago but less than seven. New under this category are slot-load and cluster-node Xserves, and the Xserve RAID enclosure. Vintage products lose support in every region except for California, where statutes require the company to serve the public longer. Both parts and service should be available from AASPs in California.